


i don't want to march here anymore

by asimpleplace



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe, Based on a Twenty One Pilots Song, Gen, I'm Bad At Tagging, M/M, March to the Sea, Mentions of Blood/Wounds, joshler if you squint i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:07:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28614075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asimpleplace/pseuds/asimpleplace
Summary: Unless his mind was playing an impossible trick on him, this was real.
Relationships: Josh Dun & Tyler Joseph, Josh Dun/Tyler Joseph
Comments: 3
Kudos: 6





	i don't want to march here anymore

**Author's Note:**

> This fanfiction is based on a dream I had last night. I randomly remembered it just a second ago and I felt the need to write something based on it. So here’s this conceptual thing. The title (as well as the entire work) is based on the song March to the Sea by Twenty One Pilots.

Monotony was endless. It seemed as if he would stay in this twilight forever, frozen in time and stagnant air as he trudged forward. Everything was the same. Light rain fell from the grey sky above, cool droplets numbing his skin.

He didn’t know how long he had been walking, but Tyler noticed through his haze that he’d been here before. Maybe they were all walking in a circle, waiting for something to break it and for his legs to collapse. Would the unsteady ground finally fall from under his feet, sending him into oblivion? A dark part of his mind secretly hoped so, and the rest stayed in a mindless, unblinking fog. 

He remembered beaches. Fragmented memories from a long time ago (or another life, maybe) flashed in his mind’s eye for a split second before fading into nothingness. He tried to hold onto the images, tried to reach out and grab them, but they fell through his hands like the sand he walked on.

Unsteady.

He took a shaky breath. His legs hurt. His feet threatened to burn through the soles of his shoes. And yet, he kept walking, despite the tiny shred of sanity he still clung to, preserved and hidden silently in the back corner of his mind. 

A raindrop gently hit the skin just below Tyler’s left eye. It was the last thing he felt there, until numbness took over, and he lost a part of himself. 

He was on a march to the sea, where he would lose all of himself. And if by some miracle he clung to a buoy, his fingers would eventually slip, paralyzed, unfeeling, just like the rest of them. 

A tear betrayed him and fell from his eye. He didn’t even know it was there until it was slowly making its way down his cheek, curving towards his chin, and finally dropping to the ground below him. He didn’t want to cry. He didn’t want to feel anything, and yet, this traitorous feeling of desperation made its way into his bones and consumed him entirely.

Why? Why now? It was almost over, why couldn’t he just give up?

Tyler’s knuckles turned white as he clenched his fists, a strength he didn’t feel one minute ago taking over his body. A last-ditch effort, it seemed. He willed it to leave and to stay at the same time. He didn’t know what was happening.

Another tear fell, blurring his vision. It was warm, and it felt like something approaching hope, which he’d figured was gone days (or maybe weeks) ago.

_ Why now? _

With a sharp intake of breath, Tyler whipped his head right, finally taking his eyes away from the short, grey-brown hair of the silent man in front of him. And, to his surprise, he was met with a pair of warm-brown eyes meeting his straight on. 

He took another unsteady breath, air not able to properly make it to his lungs despite his efforts. Colors like the other man’s eyes didn’t exist.  _ Shouldn’t _ exist, at this point in their journey. Everything was supposed to have taken on a grey tinge by now, and colors weren’t supposed to bring joy, and the long day’s journey was supposed to be coming to a close. 

But Tyler felt himself stop in his tracks, moving from the line on solid ground. He looked into the brown eyes more, more, more.

Josh. The little part of his mind that was still undeniably him supplied him with the name the eyes belonged to. Josh had found him. Somehow.

Again, tears welled up in Tyler’s eyes as he stepped forward, tentatively, shaking hands raising from his sides for the first time in too long. He was so cold. He hadn’t realized how cold he was. He didn’t want to be cold anymore.

He knew now that he desperately wanted to leave this place. Josh was here, and Tyler worried for a second that he had simply imagined him as he orbited closer to madness. And so, he raised his hands the rest of the way, stepping forward and gently cupping the other’s face.

He was real.

Unless his mind was playing an impossible trick on him, this was real.

“Tyler,” Josh breathed. He could feel part of himself come back. He could move his face, feel his skin for the first time since the rain had numbed it, and could move his chapped lips. Air began to reach his lungs.

“How-- how did you--,” Tyler started, voice barely above a whisper as his vocal chords struggled to work. He hadn’t spoken in what felt like weeks.

“That doesn’t matter,” Josh said simply. Tyler noticed the thick gash that ran from the base of his skull to the side of his forehead. It wasn’t bleeding anymore, but it was an angry red.

“Josh,” Tyler said shakily, his left hand carefully leaving the side of his face and moving up, tracing just below the wound. “Josh.”

“It’s okay. I’m okay.”

Tyler managed to tear his eyes from Josh’s, nervously looking back at the line. They were almost out of his view entirely, and the space he had occupied before was long gone. He’d never be able to return, and there was no going back.

“How do we--” Tyler started, frantically looking around him for any sign of familiarity.

Josh shook his head. “I don’t know. We have to get out of here, though. Now.” 

Caught up in the surprise of seeing his best friend again, Tyler had almost forgotten about the Watchers. They would be back at any moment. 

Tyler breathed. Him and Josh took each other’s hand, tightly, unwavering, and began to run far from the sea. 

* * *

After hours, unsteady sand turned into solid ground, the sea not visible in the slightest. And only when they no longer heard the whistles of the watchers from afar did they slow their pace, collapsing below a big oak tree. 

Tyler’s jeans were ripped open at the knee, skin exposed and bleeding. Him and Josh struggled to catch their breath, hands still clasped together, and eyes closed. They were  _ so tired _ .

When they finally opened their eyes again, and when their heartbeats had resumed to something approaching normal, Tyler opened his eyes, staring into those same warm brown ones that had taken him away from that miserable place, and realized that they now matched their surroundings. Although the sun was setting and it was growing dark, every hue was visible, untouched by the greyscale. And something about that caused him to abandon all rational thought and collapse into Josh’s arms. 

He’d wanted to do this for so long, but it was so much more  _ real  _ than he’d thought it’d be. Josh immediately returned the hug, holding Tyler close with strong arms and rubbing reassuring circles into his back while the tears fell down Tyler’s face with reckless abandon. With his free hand, Josh cupped Tyler’s face, matching what Tyler had done just hours prior. 

“I thought I was gone,” Tyler said.

“I thought you were gone,” Josh echoed.

Neither of them were gone.

Tyler bunched his hands in the fabric of Josh’s shirt, holding him as tightly as he could muster. And they stayed like that for a long time.

After a while, they grew too tired to stay awake, and Josh repositioned them so they were laying down below the tree, Josh’s arm wrapped around Tyler’s frame, and faces close together.

Tyler fell asleep first. Josh maneuvered a hand to his hair, moving his fingers through it gently. And before he fell asleep himself, he pressed a soft kiss to Tyler’s forehead.

Neither of them were gone, and they would start another day.


End file.
